• Nobles of Null is a forum based roleplay site where sci-fi and magic collide. Here, Earth remains fractured and divided despite humanity reaching out to the stars. Worse still, the trans-human slaves of one major power have escaped, only to establish their own Empire, seething with resentment at abuses of the past. Even the discovery of aliens, though medieval in development, has failed to rally these squabbling children of Earth together with its far darker implications. Worse still, is the discovery of the impossible - magic. Practiced by the alien locals, nearly depleted and therefore rare, its reality warping abilities remains abstract and distant to the general populace. All the while, unseen in the darkness of space, forces from without threaten to press in. For those with eyes opened by insight, it is clear that an era is about to end, and that a new age will dawn.

Day in the Life: Escape from the Heavenly State

Uso

Administrator
Staff member
Wiki Moderator
Jun would keep up her momentum as she slammed into the man that was trying to hit her.

She certainly remembered her Zero-G combat training. The man was swinging wildly with a weapon but lacked any leverage to really apply force. His swings were causing his body to twist and turn as much as he was swinging the weapon, greatly lessening the impact force when it hit the side of Jun's arm only to knock him back towards the door.

Jun's momentum would then carry her forward into him, her hand grabbing his throat and applying a crushing pressure that helped keep the two together as she brandished her gun by shoving the killing end up against his face, "Get the door open and you live."

"Ugh, I don't think this crew has showered in a while." Jun said wirelessly, now suddenly worried that they'd be losing out on having real showers when they switch to this 'pre-stolen' craft of theirs. "... Can you get the door open Princess Koyama?"
 

Soresu

Member
Koyama offered her rebuttal in the form of using her avatar's rapier. Prodding Hoshiko's chest. "Never doubt the power of technology! Let alone the nerd using it. You play Whack the Human and leave the leaky space tub to me." she huffed before looking to Jun. Her fleshy body had accompanied that of the female Ox who now held the human in place. Gun pointed at him.

She heard his squeals, Jun's vocal demands. The princess' faceplate came dangerously close to the human's fear-filled face. Silent, the armored tigress slowly cocked her head to the side. Her mind, and by extension suit sent a command to the ship. Fingers splayed against an access panel by the blast door. She rapidly tapped in code after code. It bleeped, the tinny screen turning green. "You know you're wearing a helmet, Jun." Reminding the Cow-form before coming back and flicking the human full on the side of his head with her fingers hard as she could.

"And I said if worse comes to worst, sister mine I would have to hard connect. So long as the ship's signal remains strong we're as golden as one of my bitch sisters' horns. If not I can act as the hub until I get to a console. Won't be pretty, however. If you ever want to survive at court, you need to learn to take stock of what you have in your arsenal and make it work to your advantage." She prodded the pirate costume-clad Hoshiko's chest again.

"Duìzhǎng, sister, I am going to start opening doors on your end. And pumping out the atmosphere. Section by section."
 

Ray of Meep

Administrator
Wiki Moderator
Wen dutifully split off from Hoshiko, heading right, flying through the corridors. His virtual figure solemnly stood still and silent, while his meatspace-self scoffed at the discussion of court etiquette. It bored and annoyed him, a silver lining to five years of pirate duty: avoiding the fake smiles and performances. Unhappy memories returning, he came upon a couple of human crew members who foolishly floated into his path. They both raised their hands in surrender, but Wen took his frustrations out on the male, turning his head into a bloody mist. He then roughly handled the crying and panicking female, restraining her limbs with metal zip ties.

The Ox-form rummaged underneath her flight suit, finding an ID card and pressed it against the scanner next to the blocking bulkhead, prompting it to open. Satisfied by his find, he dragged the squirming woman next to the nearest storage room, knocking her out with his rifle, then tossed her inside, locking the door with the stolen card as he continued forward. In the shared VR space, the map of the cargocraft updated: a corpse in the hallway and an unconscious, captured crew member in one of the offshoot rooms.
 

CadetNewb

Administrator
Staff member
Wiki Moderator
"Of course, of course Dà Niú!" the crew member tried to placate Jun. Sweat seemed to pour out of his pores as the two woman held him close, gun barrel pointed, but he quickly reached for his name tag and frantically pressed it against the sensor. It was hard to tell if it was the card or Koyama working her magic fingers, but it didn't matter. As the doors opened up, the sights and sounds of a zero-g arcade rushed in. Dragons roared as race cars burned their wheels, and gunfire rang out. Sparks flew from the door frame and the crew member on hand went quiet as a wet splat spun his body around mid-air. A man had pulled himself out of one of the sims and was trying to take shots with his handgun!

"Just be glad the sniffer modules aren't common on combat suits," Hoshiko pointed out to Jun, only to proudly thrust her chest out even more and proudly preen at Koyama's prodding. "You sure I'm trying to play wack-a-human? Put a few coins in the machines, would you?" she playfully replied to her sister. "Venting is too easy though!" the tiger-princess added, her body in meat space now passing through a hall of crew cabins. Wen meanwhile, quickly found a pair of pistols blind firing around the corner, but that didn't matter to the man. The fastest route was a lot more clear! With a swish of the ID card, the cargo-shaft doors opened, and he had a fast, straight shot through much of the ship, right up to a spot near the bridge! But the faint rumble of something far ahead added complications - like a man in an elevator shaft, Wen found one of the cargo containers hurtling down the rails!

"You'd better help Wen out though, I think he's in - " doors slid open as bare muscle and brawn flooded out of the cabins at Hoshiko in meat-space. The princess fired her rifle, smoke streaming out of the neat holes put into some of them, but she was soon grappling with the half dozen crew members that had tried to rush her down. "Yeah, maybe you should hard connect!" she suddenly covered her chest, her face flushing red in their virtuality. And her royal sister might have had a point - the bridge crew and their dated security were becoming a hindrance for Koyama. Even though she could break their ICE, it didn't give up and kept trying again! At this rate, she'd only be able to isolate access to one of their quadrants.

Unless she made that hard connection. But that meant staying behind, at least for a moment.
 
Last edited:

Ray of Meep

Administrator
Wiki Moderator
"Tamade..." The Ox-Form cursed under his breath. He got careless, gladly throwing himself into a killzone: long corridors with no cover. If the humans were any smarter they'd be filling the shaft with bullets as well.

"I spent too much time in on the bridge." Wen observed in VR, leaving his brain in meatspace to figure out a solution. "I've made a grave mistake. Fortunately, irrational actors are on both sides of this conflict."

Crouching down, maglocking himself to the "bottom" surface of the shaft, he timed his upward leap with the release of the maglocks, flinging himself towards the container at great velocity. Then, he'd fire his suit's thrusters and full power to slow himself down, to match speed with the container it made contact with his legs, taking the brunt of the force on impact. Wen grunted in pain, his muscles screaming, his bones threatening to buckle under the force. Adrenaline coursing through his body, he repositioned himself, firing his thrusters at full power again to slow the container down, looking "down" in the direction of the mass' rampage.

Tamade. It wasn't enough, the container wasn't slowing down. Wen glanced at the two sides, seeing the powered interfaces driving the mass to the bottom of the shaft. "Lady Koyama!" He shouted through the comms, eyeing warily at the floor. "Main cargo shaft, elevator, need its power reversed, now!"
 
Last edited:

Uso

Administrator
Staff member
Wiki Moderator
Jun would dive right in on their rush to get to the engineering section of the ship. Sure her hostage just got shot, but that really just made a decision for her that she'd rather not make while looking right at the guy who's former life had formerly been in her hands. As she pushed off the floor she kept her hostage infront of her to help imprison incoming rounds while she fired back at the Humans.

First was the guy shooting at her.

Then anyone else in the room.

She'd let the gun do the aiming for her, the gun automatically firing as she waved it around the room, only releasing bullets once there was something for it to shoot.

Her primary focus was looking for the next door to get down towards the engineering section. The ship's schematics didn't seem to match up with real life exactly,

"Princess Koyama, there are a bunch of computers here. Can you get access to what you need from here?"
 

Soresu

Member
Koyama only stared at the flashing lights and the sounds of an arcade opened up just ahead of her. Just not enough time to admire everything inside before the gunfire started. Following the woman along far enough to find a computer. Her physical body looked it over before connecting the little module to it. This ship's protection was admittedly respectable for its age.

"This should work."
Came the answer. "I'm not going to be able to move once this starts. So you get to shoot all the humans that try to kill us." Her weapon folded in on itself and she placed it down but close enough to grab.

"Give me a second!"
Once she was connected, " Working on Wen first! The bridge crew is being a pain in the ass that I will vent after!" Sowing in a complaint to her announcement before launching another attack.
 

CadetNewb

Administrator
Staff member
Wiki Moderator
"We're slowing down," Hoshiko began to tap her foot in their 'bridge', her cheeks still cherry red from the embarrassingly close encounter. Over in meatspace, her colors shifted and changed like a chameleon as she wrestled. These men and now women of the ship that had likely been sleeping prior were starting to wake up! She had to hurry, her own legs lashing out to send a man spinning away, bouncing off of one of the walls with a crunch. "Jun? Koyama? I suggest splitting up," she turned to the two, her gaze cool. "Jun, you just need to kill the engineering crew so they don't scuttle us," the tiger princess reminded her. The Ox-woman's mental subroutines quickly put rounds into the guard-dressed crew member, the body floating off as red globs trailed behind, but a pair of the human arcade goers tried fleeing as well, only to be swatted by her quick aim. As far as her scanning could tell, sifting through all the noise, the way ahead was clear!

"Koyama, if this ship is from the era I think it is, I'm guessing you can hack two locations with a hard connection, but I doubt you'll do better than one hack while moving!" the princess-sister realized. "Hunker down! It's not like the humans can see us if we hold still and their cameras are off," Hoshiko pointed out. Poking, prodding, breaking through the systems, the dragon princess would soon start getting a feel for this ancient ship. It wasn't that the defenses were formidable. It was built like an obstinate brick! The humans were limited in how many 'moves' they could make against her in cyberspace too - there were just so many bottle necks and compartments it was a pain for anyone to navigate or even run a program.

As this realization set in, the young dragoness went to work. Though she felt herself hemmed in by their ICE from the few directions she could go, breaking it was easy. Picking her mark, Koyama lunged through cyberspace like a sword and pierced her fingers into the netcode, the humans helpless in stopping her progress! The moment she made her move, breaks screeched as the container in front of Wen began to slow, but the momentum was too much to stop all at once! Thinking fast, the dragon-princess opened the container itself, spewing numerous canisters of food across the rails as a way through the obstacle began to gape in the mountain of packaged edibles!

"Die motherfucker!" Hoshiko pumped her fist! Thighs wrapping around head and neck, a dream flashed by as a man died with a crack.
 

Uso

Administrator
Staff member
Wiki Moderator
"Split up?" Jun asked herself, now needing to balance protecting one princess with the orders from another. She was pretty sure her career would be over if she let either of the princess' get hurt. Staying here to protect Koyama was the original plan, but not killing everyone in the engineering area would likely mean Koyama would die from someone deciding to explode the ship.

It seemed the choice was made for her.

"I'll get down to the engineering decks."

Jun would take one last look around this Arcade deck for anyone who looked too alive, and would then push off towards the engineering section.
 

Ray of Meep

Administrator
Wiki Moderator
"Gaaaah!" Wen winced as the container gave way behind his back, throwing his body through the hail of packaged food. Hard blocks and pellets pelted his armor and helmet as he emerged on the other side, almost at a stop in the middle of the long chamber, the container having fell all the way down to the bottom floor, leaving behind a trail of its contents floating, unrestrained. Annoyed more than anything else, Wen grabbed one of the packages, storing it away in his pouch, then pushed himself to one of the surfaces with his thrusters, before running upward on maglocks.

"Mushroom biscuits..." He observed dryly, examining the product in VR. It was simple, pragmatic packaging, thin aluminum foil with the manufacturer's logo and serial numbers printed on it. "... Can't imagine it's a delicacy, but some poor Republican sods are going to wish they had their rations."
 

Soresu

Member
“Try not to break anything,” Koyama said in answer to Jun. With her free hand, she hefted the weapon again. The thing expanding once more. Even as her fleshy body stood still as a statue, her virtual avatar was waging its war against the ship and those trying to push her back. And their antiquated security systems.

“For a bunch of vodka-swilling apes, they are tenacious. But mushroom biscuits? Cost-effective.” After a brief pause. And at the prospect of eating the things. Especially if unflavored. Or without some sort of packet for flavoring. Or if the flavoring was cheap. “Alright. No fucks or quarter given.”

“I’m going to lock out the Engineering consoles with access only for Jun and myself and keep communications under my thumb.”
Koyama wished she could bop Hoshiko with her saber gun thing. But settled for merely saying, “Clever girl.” in remark to humans and their piss poor vision. “I’m killing the lights for your section.” The princess warned Hoshiko.
 

CadetNewb

Administrator
Staff member
Wiki Moderator
Clearing the Arcade and the nearby guest rooms, Jun soon found herself in one of the transit hubs of the ship. She could tell that one of the tubes was out of order, but an air-scooter floated in zero-g by the entrance. However, being bull headed, she blew past it and kept going. Jun was probably faster without it anyways, right?

"Hurry up! That Synth-Cow is coming this way!" a man yelled in engineering. Holding the only motion sensor on hand, the beeping grew louder and faster as Jun closed in on their position.

"I'm locked out! I can't deploy the sentry!" a woman began to punch and kick the computer console. "Work damn you!" Despite the Chinese localization, the panels were all flashing with a red and yellow "Сука Блять! Сука Блять! Сука Блять!" as a cartoon brown bear vomited rainbows.

"It's almost outside!" a man grabbed a rifle and aimed at the barricaded door, the others bringing their pistols to bear. Outside, Jun had exited the transit tube and came up to engineering, but through the armor-glass slit in the doors, could see that all sorts of furniture, crates, and even an unlicensed forklift had been used to barricade the door. There was no way in, and the sad, rattling sound of the ill maintained air conditioning vent above punctuated this sad reality. "I-it's stopped moving. Why?" the engineer inside muttered, the consoles continuing to flash red. Koyama had held up her end and had managed to worm through their ICE easily enough, even as her Tiger-Sister grumbled, furious mashing buttons on a controller in their virtuality.

"HA!" she yelled in triumph. The moment her Dragon-Sister cut the lights in meatspace, Hoshiko's suit speakers roared like a tiger at full blast, and in the darkness, her gun wrenched free and blood splashed as the muzzle flashed. "Eat it humans!" she began to dance in their virtuality. As Hoshiko shoved the dead bodies out of her way, blood globulating in the air, the Tigress's celebrations were a distraction for Koyama. Settled into the arcade, the young dragon could hear another door hiss open as a tentative breath was taken.

"H-hello? Mm-M-monster? Are....are you still here?" a young woman could be heard. "Y-you still mad?" Concealed by the noise of the machines and flashing lights, it was difficult to tell precisely where the other was. Meanwhile, Wen found his mushroom ration filled cargo shaft putting up much less resistance. Practically a straight shot down the spine of the ship, he was making the fastest progress to his objective, and came close to the exit roughly the same time Jun came to hers.

"I don't see anything! It's just a bunch of food everywhere," a man popped his head into the cargo shaft. "Damnit! Someone forgot to secure the container!" he swore, swatting at one of the packages. Standard issue Republican rifle raised in his 'up' towards his 'ceiling', the man might as well have been sticking out of the wall as far as Wen was concerned. "You sure this is the right shaft?" The mushroom ration swatted aside went tumbling straight at Wen as another man leaned out to look from behind the first!
 
Last edited:

Uso

Administrator
Staff member
Wiki Moderator
"pew pew pew," Jun called out as she fired a burst of shots at the door's armored view-slit. The bullets ended up shattering against the armored window... which was about what she expected but she was kinda hoping that'd work.

She then tried shooting the panel next to the door.

A frustrated frown came to her face as she realized that wasn't going to work either.

This left only one thing she was familiar with from the stories... going through the ventilation shafts to hunt these humans down and kill them just like in that one movie about this sort of thing... Die Hard.

"BANG!"

Jun shot at the ventilation system, blowing a hole big enough in it that she could tear it open with her strength to gain access.

Now all that was left was to squeeze in there and try to get to where she could shoot some people.
 

Ray of Meep

Administrator
Wiki Moderator
Wen paused his advance, anchoring himself to one of the walls. Calmly, he turned back, facing the two soon-to-be corpses. "Dumbasses, don't even know their own ship." He muttered, firing three rounds at the humans, two of them making impact with grey matter. With a snort, he turned back around, climbing up to the door at the end. With a deep breath, he scanned his stolen card to open it, then held his rifle before him, shooting anyone on sight.
 

Soresu

Member
"You're welcome," Koyama retorted as she floated past Hoshiko in their virtual space. But there was little she could do for Jun. Except for possibly suggesting a reduction in her chest size. That, however, was a subject for another day. "While you're roaring like a horny tiger. I'm being called a monster in meatspace. And all I'm doing is standing here." muttered the princess.

And true to her remark, she had heard the call and question. Her suit's sensors perked up. With the Ox gone, and on her own, jacked into the ship's system, Koyama was on her own. Her flesh and blood lips pursed as their virtual counterparts did. The suit began to sweep with infra-red, ultra-violet. Filtering for the flashing lights and heat generated therein. Slapping on additional ones for humanoid profiles and movement.

"And if I am, little mouse?" her fleshy voice echoed near the threshold of where she and Jun had entered. Where that human man had been held at gunpoint. As if to punctuate the point she emitted a purr. With her weapon in her other hand, and the suit's sensors/HUD sweeping the area the assault rifle tended to follow what caught her 'eyes'. But out of curiosity, she had fed those vocal patterns into her armor. Discreetly querying this ship on the identity of its owner.
 

CadetNewb

Administrator
Staff member
Wiki Moderator
Inside engineering, the three human crew members watched as their glimpse outside vanished, the transparent aluminum distorting and blackening as the projectiles embedded and detonated.

"Ancestors, what is it doing?" the woman inside recoiled from Jun's violence, their own door terminal lighting up with warning signs as the big ox blasted apart its counterpart on her side.

"I don't - she's shooting something?" one of the two men realized, the faint, dull thumps of her gun muffled by the armored door.

"S-she's getting closer!" As though to emphasize the danger they were all in, the steady click-click-clicks of the motion sensor were interrupted with a shrill whine that only grew louder and louder. Floating through zero-g, the woman clambered for the engineering air vent, hands wrenching the cover off as the cheap stamped steel sheet gave way.

"I'm getting out of h - " Poking her helmeted head into the vent, her ears felt like she had suddenly been dunked underwater, the sounds muffling away to an eerie silence. Headlights automatically turning on, she saw the shaft in front of her writhe and worm as Jun's therm-optic camouflage tried to hide her oncoming approach from the engineer's ever widening eyes. Wen meanwhile, lined up his shots.

"You idiot, get d - " The bubble-like helmet of the first crew member suddenly painted itself red from the inside out as a hole appeared in the visor, the Ox-man's follow up shot knocking the body aside even more in the zero-g before the last of the triple-tap brained the unsuited companion. His yellow hard-hat spiraled into the air with a "Shit!" before Wen rounded the corner and fired again. Another shot rang out, the armor piercing magnum flipping through the space between them as flecks of unburned powder bounced off his helmet. Fortunately, it was the hull that took the hit, and not him. Up ahead however, was his prize - the bridge.

Only, its armored doors were shut too.

"Hey! I'm not a hor - " Hoshiko briefly paused in their virtuality. "I'm not roaring like a horny tiger!" she quickly corrected herself, cheeks puffing up at her sister in indignity. She put a lot of effort into that roar too! Not that it mattered - in meatspace, Koyama could hear another, more important cry. This one, of fear.

"Oh noooo!" Shots rang out as several of the arcade machines became perforated by panicked fire, the rounds going wide of the dragon princess. The fragments drifting around the space was more of a problem to her at this rate, especially if they bounced off her and gave her away. Unfortunately for this 'Liáo Ruì', Koyama figured from the system, this human was unlikely to have any better aim even if the princess was in plain sight. Eighteen years of age was not much time for a human to work on that, let alone a social studies grad! From her 'hidden' spot, Koyama could make out....struggling? Flailing?

"Aww, Wen got to the bridge first!" the tiger princess whined, if only a little. Crossing her arms, she sighed as a few more rounds were popped off in meatspace. "The signs say there's life-supp - " Hoshiko stopped cold as one of the doors slammed closed, the bridge crew trying their best to keep her away! "Ugh, rude. Seriously though, do I try and vent them all, or just go help you out," she looked at Wen. "Getting the bridge is the original plan, but if they're stuck on a console trying to keep me out, with Koyama poking at them too, that means someone's on the computer. Maybe more than one," the tiger princess pointed out.

Even as she said this though, the fire suppression system flashed a warning at Koyama - if it went off in the arcade, the gas would render her visible!
 

Uso

Administrator
Staff member
Wiki Moderator
*POP* - *SPLAT*

Jun didn't waste any time shooting the head when it pop'd into the vent, aside from the time she needed to get the gun out infront of her so she could actually shoot it. Shortly after that she'd fire down through the vent to make a bigger hole down into the room below so she could stick the barrel of the gun down a bit and start shooting in hopes she'd kill her targets before her targets started shooting up into the vents.

"JUST VENT THEM ALREADY!" Jun shouted in virtual space, "These vents aren't built to let someone like me squirm through. I'm stuck like... something... that's stuck!"

Jun didn't have time to figure out a metaphor!

Or if that was an Analogy instead of a Metaphor.

She hoped she wasn't about to get shot.

That never felt good.
 

Ray of Meep

Administrator
Wiki Moderator
"Mu'niu (female cattle) has the right idea." Wen nodded, tapping his card on the scanner a couple of times before giving up. "These Lie'min (inferior peasants) are being stubborn. We should just make it easier for both of us and put them out of their misery. Just space the entire ship; it'll help with the fires as well." He double checked the doors, then looked back to shoot anyone that tried to get behind him and Hoshiko.
 

Soresu

Member
Koyama huffed in the virtual space. Her avatar seated cross-legged and floating around aimlessly. "Then both of you get to deal with the fallout." the Princess declared. Sending the tendrils she had been worming into the ship's system toward the airlock and venting controls.

"Starboard and Port airlocks will open in twenty seconds, maybe shorter. Their ICE is old and the humans are trying to keep me at bay." She complained a little. "Opening compartments for widespread venting. The bridge will be a bit tougher. I have the card you've been using Duìzhǎng, I'll get up the clearance. Maybe that'll open it. If not. Well. I have a whole ship to kill and you two are smart. Figure something out."

Koyama grunted as the fire suppression system came to life. "You know, Liáo Ruì," using the girl's name. "I would find someplace safe to hide now if I were you." her meatspace voice holding that courtly cultured tone. One used to command.

"Otherwise, I will hunt you down. And then? Well. All those stories you Humans say about us we will figure out if they're true or not!" The voice boomed behind the grad student. She made her threats all while telling the ventilation of the area to begin sucking the air from the room. If anything it'd slow the progression or reverse it. The dragon in tiger form's physical body meanwhile held her weapon steady. Head turned toward the noise, IR vision on with the rifle aiming here or there. Ready to fire.

This was the girl's chance to escape. But if the opportunity presented itself. The Daqin wouldn't hesitate. "I could always try to increase pressure in your vent, Jun. And shoot you out like one of those primitive potato guns humans make for stupidity's sake."
 

CadetNewb

Administrator
Staff member
Wiki Moderator
Time was more malleable for the Daqinren, their neurons and cybernetics allowing them to think and sense things faster than any human possibly could. For Jun, this meant very clearly perceiving every single frame of information that her eyes could take in. The visor in front of the woman cracked as the tiny rocket entered, the human female's eyes crossing as her head snapped back. But this drawn out moment happened in a blur. Jun burst out of the vents after the corpse like an alien out of a body, fragments of the covering flying about. Suit sensors taking in the scene, her instinct-routines brought her weapon to bear and fired. A republican auto-rifle let out its slow, long string of barks in reply as the human man flinched and reeled back, his trigger finger squeezing down in death. Huge, armor piercing rounds whizzed past Jun and landed, a wet splat washing across the nearby wall as they exploded inside the other man's suit.

But the sting and her data-feed told Jun plenty - a single shot from the other human's pistol zipped through her back and stopped at the front plate, neatly perforating her kidney, but doing little to stop her. The mouth of the vent refusing to let her hips pass was more troublesome, but even that groaned and gave way. However, that only meant one thing for Jun now. She had engineering all to herself.

"You're fine," Hoshiko reassured Jun authoritatively, her eyes snapping over to the Ox. "Administer three em-gee neodrenaline stimdose, maintain blood levels at five hundred en-gee per liter and it won't even bother you," the tigress advised. Even though Jun was fighting with them, she was still a civilian, and Hoshiko had to make sure she'd do her part. Even as she said that though, she finally caught up with Wen. Stacking up at the door with him, she quickly discarded the magazine and inserted a fresh one to top off. "Once Koyama has it open, let's flash and smoke, no chaff. Betting they don't have thermals," the princess smugly put her hands on her hips, chest out proudly.

Inside the Arcade, its lights and sounds still pumping away, Koyama could make out the shuffle of rubber soled shoes against plastic floor, the ruffle of fabric and the squeech of plastic on plastic as curtains were hastily drawn. Rui was likely hiding in one of the arcade machines, and Koyama had a good guess as to which cluster now, but there were more pressing matters. She had been taking turns playing whack-a-mole with the humans on the bridge, opening and closing doorways to let Hoshiko and Wen progress but now that she started venting the ship? The princess was on the offensive. It didn't matter that they stopped it here or there, she was already somewhere else in the network and starting to vent that! The princess could practically see the echoes of their frantic button presses in cyberspace, and they were a color all too sweet to her eyes. But this also meant something else - she could bump up the security clearance for their card without anyone looking!

"You ready Wen?"

FWISHHHHAAAAAHHH!

Cold washed over Koyama as a fire extinguisher blinded her, freezing CO2 washing over her suit.
 
Top